


Second String

by Accipiter_Ater



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Mentions of Broadcast Execution, Mentions of neglect, No Team RWBY
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,550
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25962679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Accipiter_Ater/pseuds/Accipiter_Ater
Summary: Destiny is a strange concept. It is often assumed that specific individuals are chosen for set roles and that destiny will bend over backward to ensure those individuals always fit those roles. Destiny, however, does not work that way. There are roles to be filled, and specific individuals may fill those rolls more often than not, but this does not mean that they always do. In the infinity of possible universes circumstances sometimes align just right to cast out destiny’s preferred players requiring a new lead cast to be found. This is one of those universes, meet destiny’s second string casting for a slightly different team of four girls that attend Beacon the year of the 40th Vytal Festival, Team CBNT (cabernet).
Relationships: Neopolitan/Ruby Rose (RWBY), TBD - Relationship
Kudos: 1





	1. New Players

Noir was topping up on hard light dust in Vale to get ready to go back to school. She was waiting in the back by the magazines for the attendant to package her order when four men in suits carrying guns and machetes along with a man in a white suit entered. The man ordered his men to seize as much of the dust as possible. Eventually, she was found one of the goons pointed his gun at her and told her to freeze. Noir slowly raised her hands and turned around, keeping her face neutral. Once she was facing the man, she flexed her fingertips, and a grey-blue barrier blasted out in front of her hurling the guy through the storefront window. She dissipated the field, allowing the aura to rush back into her. The young girl clicked her bracer to life, and a light teal energy field burst out of it along with the barrel of a small-caliber gun, the shield could cover most of her body. Facing the next closet thug, she fired a few shots at him before sending another of her barriers to slam him into the wall knocking him out. At this point, the ringleader had noticed her and waved for the other two men to get her. Keeping the shield between her and them, she held her position.

"I can sit here all night, boys," she taunted.

That did the trick as the gunman opened fire while the one with the machete charged her. As he was changing direction to get around her Stalwart Aegis, another grayish-blue barrier appeared which he slammed into dazing himself. Noir executed a charge of her own, shield checking the grunt to the dirt then continuing to bowl him over making sure to step on his crotch. At his cry, the remaining grunt and ringleader flinched. Deploying her firearm again from the center of her shield she blasted away at the two downing the last grunt but the white-clad thief deftly evaded her shots.

"Look, Miss Black, I really don't have time for you right now so if you would be so kind as to get out of the way I won't have to end you."

"On the contrary thief, it looks like I'm the one who is winning your guys are all down, and I have barely taken a hit. I think you should just surrender and save us both the trouble 

Noir released another spray of rounds at the thief as she began to charge in his direction. However, he spun past her shield and delivered a blow to the back of her head with his cane.

Or he would have, had a foot square greyish shield intercepted the attack. Noir pivoted and brought her shield to slam into the thief knocking him into another of her conjured barriers.

Muttering to himself the man brought his cane back up hesitated then pointed it at one of the windows displays the end cap popped a crosshair was stenciled on it. A rocket screamed out of the cane and detonated the display. Noir was able to surround herself with her barriers, but she still felt a hit to her aura. Part of the storefront collapsed, but through the smoke, Noir saw the thief run off and begin scaling a nearby fire escape. After checking with the cashier, Noir created a long thin barrier and stepped up onto the end pivoting her conjuration she sent herself up and onto the roof, raising her shield again as she touched down. However, the man in white was already hopping aboard a Bullhead that had risen from behind the building.

He chuckled to himself upon seeing her, "My, aren't you a persistent one but this is the end of the line, Miss Black," he reached into his coat and pulled out a raw red dust crystal and tossed it to the roof before firing again at it.

Noir braced behind her barriers, but as the explosion rocked the building, she didn't feel the drain on her aura she expected looking up a bright purple glyph spun in the air between the barriers and the fireball. Looking to her right, she saw the source of the glyph a woman with platinum blonde hair and a very professional looking blouse and slacks combo glared at the bullhead.

The man in white disappeared into the forward section of the bullhead a few seconds later a woman stepped into the open bay, she stayed towards the back of the cargo bay, so her face was concealed in shadow, but orange flames were visible leaking from her right eye. The mysterious woman attacked the huntress tongues of orange fire lanced from her hand only to be met with the violet glyphs cast by the huntress.

Noir decided to take some of the pressure of the huntress and create barriers her own and intercepted the flames before they reached the glyphs. The huntress turned to Noir her mouth open slightly as if about to speak when the bullhead's engines roared, and it began to turn away. The huntress snapped her attention back to the criminals and conjured a massive ice spike and hurled it at the airship the fire girl waved a hand and shattered the spike pieces flying in all directions. A flick of the huntresses riding crop caused the shattered pieces to curve around the bullhead and strike the other side. Most of the shards broke even further on the armored exterior of the craft, though a small number though found purchase puncturing the airframe. However, the damage was light, and after shuddering for a fraction of a second, the airship escaped.

"So you're an actual huntress that was pretty impressive. My sister would ask for your autograph."

The elder blonde cast a frigid glare at the younger girl.

——

Noir wasn't exactly sure what she was in trouble for, sure the bad guy got away, but she kept most of the dust from being stolen and kept the shop owner alive. Shouldn't she be getting a reward?

A swift crack snapped her back to reality the blonde had cracked her switch on the table, "You haven't even heard a word I said."

Noir shrugged, "I don't get why I'm being lectured, didn't I help stop a robbery why is that being treated as a bad thing?"

"The issue is that you are fifteen years old. You are not qualified to dispense justice like that."

"I wasn't just dispensing justice I was defending myself the guys tried to rob me too. If I have the skills why am I not allowed to use them when threatened?"

"Look, none of this is really the point. If it were up to me I would send you home with a pat on the head," Noir perked up a little, "And a slap on the wrist. But there is someone else who would like to speak with you."

At that moment, the door behind the blonde opened to reveal Beacon's headmaster carrying a plate of cookies and a mug of milk.

"Noir Nightshade you …" he leaned in, "have silver eyes."

"And yours are brown, so what." Noir was not interested in talking about her eyes of all things right now. 

"So where did you learn to do this." Ozpin gestured to the security footage of her confrontation playing on a tablet.

"Siren Academy."

"I wasn't aware Siren had such specialized curriculum."

"It doesn't really. It's no Signal. I mostly take brawling classes at school the rest I had to work out on my own."

"So you got this good all by yourself?"

Noir shrugged, "I mean I had my mom to help me, and my sister and I built our combat styles around each other, so we practice all the time. But there wasn't like a teacher that took any special interest in me."

"So what is a girl like you planning to do with her skills?" Ozpin had a bit of a twinkle in his eye.

"Well in two more years I'm going to follow my sister into Beacon, then I want to be a huntress."

"So you want to fight monsters?"

"Grimm, criminals, you know the bad guys I want to help people by getting rid of them. Being a huntress just seems like the best way to start righting wrongs."

"Noir, do you know who I am?" Ozpin had a strange smile on his face the blonde behind him looked like she ate something very sour.

"Sure, you're Professor Ozpin Beacon's Headmaster."

"Hello."

"Hi," Noir was sure that was a pretty pathetic response, but she ran with it.

"So you want to come to my school?"

"I really do." Noir decided to add a bit more to the line, "More than anything."

The look the blonde gave Ozpin when he turned to her would have killed a lesser man. Ozpin turned back to Noir, "Well, okay then."

"Wait that's it no tests no interviews just a welcome to the school." Noir was freaking out a little. "I didn't mean like right now! I've still got a lot to learn."

"Does this mean you will say no?" Ozpin almost looked disappointed. "If it makes you feel any better, we can count the robbery as your entrance exam and this as your interview."

"But I'll be two years behind everyone else in their non-combat coursework, what if I can't catch up. What if I fail all of my classes." Noir's mind was running at a mile a minute; what-if scenarios were bouncing off each other as she tried to hold herself together.

"Miss Nightshade," Ozpin reached across the table to grab her arm, when Noir flinched away he retracted, "Miss Nightshade you have held near-perfect grades at Siren Academy for the past three years you will adapt to Beacon's curriculum even if it takes a semester or two for you to do so you won't fail completely. However, if it truly is too much of a worry for you, I can instead reserve you a spot for when you feel ready."

"You're sure I'd be fine, Professor?" Noir's resolve was wavering in the face of the headmaster's confidence.

"I'm sure, Miss Nightshade."

One last issue still nagged at Noir's conscience, "One last thing Professor how am I supposed to pay for Beacon my mother could only afford to send my sister with a scholarship and those deadlines have passed I don't think my family can afford to send me to Beacon."

"Since you are a personal invite of mine I will pay all of your schooling costs. Does that assuage your last doubts, Miss Nightshade?"

Noir could no longer find any more reasons to protest, "That about covers everything Professor so, I'll do it. I'll come to Beacon this year."

——

"This is so amazing I can't believe my little sis is coming to Beacon with me!" A tiny girl dressed in a white combat skirt with white hair clung to Noir while also bouncing up and down.

"Blanche how many times do I have to say it you can't call me your 'little' sister I'm like a foot taller than you." Noir tried to sound annoyed, but her sister's antics never failed to put a smile on her face.

Blanche gave a little huff and pulled herself off the taller girl before a glint crept into her eye, "Fine then, I can't believe my baby sister is coming to Beacon with me. I mean everyone is going to think you're awesome. You did something super cool I bet you're the youngest ever to make it into the school."

"Blanche you know I don't care much about standing out I really wanted to go to Beacon on my own time, but Professor Ozpin's offer was too good to pass up. Regardless I am still two years behind everyone else they're all going to expect some prodigy, and I'm not really."

"But Noir you totally stopped a bunch of adults from stealing a bunch of dust nobody else has done that."

"But it doesn't mean they couldn't they all have had two more years of training they all probably could beat me."

"You always beat me sis, and I've been training as long as they have."

"Blanche I always beat you because I have like three times the aura you do, and I know all your moves."

The girl's attention was dragged from each other when the news report changed to an image of the blonde woman Noir met the night before. "Hello, and welcome to Beacon! My name is Glynda Goodwitch."

"So that's her name," Noir murmured.

"You are among a privileged few who have received the honor of being selected to attend this prestigious academy! Our world is experiencing an incredible time of peace, and as future Huntsmen and Huntresses, it is your duty to uphold it. You have demonstrated the courage needed for such a task, and now it is our turn to provide you with the knowledge and the training to protect our world."

Blanche rushed to the window, "Hey Noir, do you think you can see Signal from here I always wondered what it looked like." Without waiting for an answer, the excited girl continued, "What about Siren or home maybe we can spot those?"

"Sis, our home is Beacon now." Noir's voice has a bit of a playful edge to it as she smiled at her sister.

* * *

17 Years Earlier

* * *

Raven Branwen wasn't scared of anything, especially not an intangible concept like commitment. Or at least that's what she would tell anyone who accused her of such. She just didn't want to get married; she only said yes because Tai had gotten her drunk. She wasn't supposed to get involved with her teammates at Beacon; she was just supposed to learn to kill huntsmen and then go back to the tribe. Raven had already neglected that responsibility long enough. However, Raven had no easy way back to the tribe; the only bond she had was her father, and she had felt that bond fade almost a year ago. Unfortunately, this meant Raven had to take the long way back. It would take months to find the tribe once she got to Anima.

Raven took a pre-dawn ferry to Vale. She spent the morning attempting to get passage as part of the security compliment on a ship heading to Anima regardless of how she pushed she couldn't find someone both going to the right part of Anima and willing to hire her without registering her huntsman card. If she used her ID, all it would take Taiyang was a trip to Ozpin to see what ship she took, same with traveling as a private passenger she had no doubts that Ozpin would be able to get into the manifests as well. 

Finally, after two weeks she heard of a captain who routinely took unregistered huntsmen with him. The little cargo barge moored at the end of the pier did little to inspire confidence, but it had taken her so long to find an option that fit her needs she pressed ahead, "Your captain where is he I'd like to speak to him."

The nearest hand turned to her, "And what does a girl like you need a man like the cap'n f'r?"

"I need him to take me to Anima. I'll only talk specifics with him." The leer on the sailor's face was starting to annoy Raven, all it would take was one cut to open a space on the crew for her. However, murdering the man's crew was probably not the best way to earn his trust.

"You can pay I assume Cap'n don' work for free."

Raven rested a hand on the hilt of her sword, "I got this, I'm willing to work, the rest I'll talk to your captain about."

"Fine, I'll see if the cap'n will see you," the deckhand wandered on board the ship.

Raven waited several minutes before the same deckhand came back down the plank and took her on board and then below deck stopping outside a door toward the rear of the ship. "He'll see you now."

Raven walked through the door and was greeted by the pungent smell of cigarette smoke the captain was a wiry man with a sun-beaten face and a violent glint in his eye, "So Miss,

"Raven,"

"Miss Raven, my man tells me you're lookin' to get to Anima, and are willing to sell your sword. You got a Huntsman card?"

Raven decided to start off in an explorative direction, "Word on the street is you'll take people without them."

"I do on occasion, but it certainly makes payment easier. Won't pay you as well either, card comes with a certain quality guarantee."

"And if I have a card but didn't want you to log it officially?"

"I may be able to find a few more lien for you, but the fact that you don't want your presence on my ship logged carries an inherent risk."

"So what can you pay me?"

"I have about four hundred lien I can spare for someone like you."

"You can do better that's not even an eighth of what a huntsman would cost you can do at least a thousand."

"Look, girl, you're the one who doesn't want to be treated as a huntress here. Take your card to any other ship, and they'll pay you the going rate. I hold all the cards here nobody else will take you without the card you don't want to use for whatever reason it will be four hundred, or you get off my ship."

Raven knew she had been beaten; she had no bargaining power. "Fine, I'll take the four hundred. When do you leave?"

The captain pulled out his scroll. After a few seconds of flipping through apps, "Tomorrow morning with the tide, be back here at dawn."

"If it makes no difference to you I figured I'd just bunk on the ship that way nobody gets left behind."

"Suit yourself girl go find a bunk."

* * *

Note on Siren Academy:  
Siren as a concept stems from several other ideas for fanfics that I have had. It is what I use for an alternate primary combat school in Vale proper for when I need to keep an OC isolated from regular cast members prior to Beacon. It is fairly amorphous in nature, but in this instance, it is cheaper than both Signal and Pharos, Siren accepts a larger number of students than either school, however, due to this, it gives a more generalized combat education with less focus on individual styles. This means its students, unless highly motivated, are generally of a lower quality than either Signal's or Pharos'. This means fewer students from Siren make it into Beacon than Signal or Pharos even though Siren is the largest school. Many Siren students do make it into other academies though, the rest go on to serve in the military or police forces.


	2. An Old Face

Blanche looked around in wonder as she stepped off the airship, the moment was ruined as the boy who had been sick on the ship scrambled off to further empty his stomach into a nearby trash can. Blanche wanted to explore the campus a bit before the welcoming ceremony and so made an excuse to Noir about meeting her friends and rushed off. She knew it was a flimsy excuse; she was the only one of her friend group from Siren to make it into Beacon, but Noir knew she was just trying to go off alone and would respect that.

As Blanche wandered, she lost track of her surroundings, not noticing the huge pallet coming up behind her until it knocked her over.

Blanche quickly got back to her feet before rounding on the offending cart operator. “Watch it you could have killed me with that.” Looking at the cart, she was glad it had only clipped her, not run her over; it was piled high with steel ingots strapped down with red ratchet straps emblazoned with a rosebud emblem with the bottom half resembling a gear. “What are you doing charging down the main path with cargo like that!”

From behind the massive stack stepped one of the tallest girls Blanche had ever seen at least half a foot taller than her sister. She had wine red hair and wore a long cranberry combat dress accented with black armor pieces. The other girl’s eyes narrowed down at Blanche, “Or, maybe you should watch your surroundings better. What are you doing up here anyway I thought families had to be left at the dock in Vale, did you sneak onto the ship behind your brother or sister?”

“I’ll have you know I am 17 years old. I’m just vertically challenged. I have every right to be here.”

“Clearly you don’t seeing as you don’t even have the spatial awareness to notice several hundred-pound pallet carts. It’s not as if it’s the quietest thing around.”

“Well, I didn’t expect weapon-grade steel to be delivered through the front door on the first day of school. Why would I be looking for a cargo trolly in a crowd of people?” Blanche was getting seriously angry at this girl, “What kind of princess do you think you are running innocent girls down and then blaming them for being in the way.”

“Not princess, heiress actually,” a new voice but into the argument. “Corundum Hesperrhodos, heiress to Hesperrhodos Manufacturing, also known as the second richest girl on the planet.” Blanche turned toward the voice and saw a blonde girl maybe an inch or two taller than her sister wearing a yellow gold martial arts robe tied together with an orange sash

The look on Corundum’s face was somewhere between pride and annoyance, “Look, it’s not that big of a deal I’m only the heiress so long as my brother stays without kids.”

“The same company that is known for following the SDC’s example with their labor practices.”

“Okay, that’s not fair the SDC controls Atlas’s labor laws, we’re forced to play by their rules or our dust supply mysteriously drys up.” The girl continued to murmur something to herself, but Blanche couldn’t catch it. “Anyway, I need to get this dropped off before they start orientation.” Corundum then stepped back behind the cart, its motor spinning up as it began gliding towards Beacon.

Blanche turned back to the blonde to thank her for defusing the situation, but she was already walking away. Sighing, Blanche turned back towards the path and promptly ran into someone else and falling back on the ground. Blanche closed her eyes and just lay there for several seconds. Eventually, a somewhat timid voice called out to her, “Are-are you okay? I didn’t kill you, did I?”

Still keeping her eyes closed, she responded, “No, to both. I’m perfectly fine to just lie here for the rest of the day. The world has made it abundantly clear that this is where it wants me.”

“Are you sure, I mean, don’t we need to get to orientation soon right.”

Mentally grumbling Blanche opened her eyes to see who was standing over her, jumping to her feet and backing away when she saw it was the kid who had puked all over the airship. “You’re all better, right, Vomit Boy?”

Blanche could feel the pain in his voice as he responded, “It was just a little airsickness, my name’s Jaune.”

“Fine, Jaune, let’s get to orientation.” Blanche only half paid attention to their conversation as she followed him to the theater. 

Eventually, Blanche noticed that they had passed through the same courtyard twice before, “Stop Vomit Boy, we’re going in circles.”

“Look, airsickness is more common than people let on.”

“Look, I’m sorry, but is that seriously that was the least important part of what I said.”

“What if I called you Timber or something else related to falling over.”

“Really, Timber is the best you can come up with, and anyway, I bumped into you by accident, and that other girl ran me over.”

“Well, the name’s Jaune Arc! Short, sweet, rolls off the tongue - ladies love it!”

“Do they?”

“They will! Well, I-I hope they will. My mom always says that... Never mind.”

“Anyway, I’m Blanche Neige, so I can do this” Blanche drew what appeared to be a thick cylindrical bar of steel from her waist. As she brought it forward, it seemed to liquify in her hand and formed into a staff topped with her snowflake emblem. Her off-hand flipped open a blue capsule on her belt as she dipped the base into a nearby fountain a circular glyph shimmered on the water’s surface before the entire fountain froze solid.

Jaune looked stunned, “Was that magic?”

Blanche rolled her eyes, where had this guy trained, “That was just some fairly basic dust manipulation,” as she talked, Blanche allowed her staff to melt back into the metal bar and clipped it back to her waist. “That last bit was just my semblance I can take any metal infused with dust and change it like it was a liquid. What do you have.”

“Jaune was still looking at her like she had grown an extra head, but he managed to draw a sword from his belt, “I have this sword.”

“Okay,” Blanche was trying very hard to seem impressed; maybe he had a really cool semblance.

“Yeah, and I’ve got a shield, too!” Jaune grabbed his scabbard, and as he affixed it to his arm, it expanded into a kite shield.

“So, what do they do?”

“Well, that’s pretty much it. I mean, the shield folds up, so when I get tired of carrying it, I can just put it away.”

“I guess that makes sense. I’m more interested in dust, and how to use it, weapon fabrication isn’t really my thing. And it’s not like I really have to learn it anyway. I can create any weapon I can imagine given enough steel.”

“So let me get this straight your weapon is a stick.” Jaune seemed like he was trying not to laugh.

“So what if it is. I hated the smithing class, white dresses, and soot do not go together.”

“Wait, other students made their weapons?”

“I mean yeah all combat schools have their students make their own weapons. Didn’t you?” Blanche was getting very confused by this guy. He seemed amazed by dust manipulation and had questions about weapon construction. He must have been homeschooled.

“It’s a hand-me-down. My great-great-grandfather used it to fight in the war.”

Yep definitely homeschooled, “Well, sounds like a family heirloom, I guess I can appreciate the classics.”

Jaune seemed sort of defeated, “Yeah, the classics.”

“Anyway, why were you right behind me out there in the courtyard?”

“You seemed like you were having a bad time so I was gonna offer my help, my mom always says, ‘Strangers are just friends you haven’t met yet.’”

“So back to what started this conversation, where are you going, ’cause I was following you.”

Jaune looked a bit stressed, “But, I was following you. Y-You think there might be a directory? Maybe a food court? Some kind of recognizable landmark? Is, uh... Is that a ‘no’?” 

Blanche let out a little desperate laugh, “That’s a no.”

* * *

17 Years Earlier

* * *

The voyage to Anima was reasonably uneventful. There were surprisingly few water-based Grimm, and most of the ones that did exist were massive territorial beasts that claimed vast swaths of ocean making running into them very unlikely. The journey on the small cargo ship was longer than Raven had anticipated. It had taken almost three weeks to complete the trip. 

Once she was onshore, Raven made her way into the forest and attempted to shift into her bird form keyword being attempted. As she tapped into the magic, Ozpin gave her a burning pain flared in the base of her stomach like the magic hit a wall and violently bounced off. Sitting against a tree, Raven began thinking through possible reasons why. 

Had the old man removed the ability from her when she ran? No, that couldn’t be it Ozpin had made it very clear that once his power was given, he could not recall it.

Maybe he had altered it, leaving the magic but removed its purpose? No, that didn’t make sense either; he had had to touch her and Qrow when he gave the powers. Thus, it stood to reason that he would have to be that close to her to change it since, once given, his magic had no connection to him anymore.

If the power itself could not be changed, then it stood to reason that something about her had changed instead. The more she thought the more an idea formed in her head, an idea she very much did not like. It had been five weeks since she left Patch, and she realized she had missed her cycle, and the placement of the pain in her lower abdomen pointed to one thing. Taiyang had left her a little present that night. 

Not quite accepting it, yet Raven made her way back into the little port town and stole a test from a local drugstore. Sure enough, it confirmed her suspicions.

While she first thought about getting rid of the baby, it wasn’t really practical, and she would need a kid eventually to follow after her in the tribe anyway, why not this one. Taiyang wasn’t weak at least physically speaking, so as long as the kid inherited her personality, it would be fine. Of course, she could always wait to give birth and then drop the kid on Taiyang via a portal. Ultimately though, Raven decided to keep the kid, a little Redwing Branwen, to be her successor.

The biggest problem she now faced was travel. If she couldn’t find the tribe soon, she would be too heavy to secure her place at the top. She needed to decide if it made sense to go out and look for the tribe now or go to Mistral and wait out the pregnancy there and then find the tribe.

Raven asked around town to see how safe it was. According to several young women, there was a group of bandits that often raided the area; however, they couldn’t be called a tribe. It was maybe about ten people that raided outlying farms. She once brought up the Branwen tribe with a guardsman though he had never heard of them. The tribe had always operated around Mistral anyway, so it wasn’t surprising that they were unknown out at the coast.

Raven decided her best bet was to find a way to Mistral. To that end, Raven made her way back to the port to talk with the freight master there.

He proved easy enough to find the old man was lounging in front of the single warehouse by the pier. He turned his head as she approached him, “I don’t sell to individuals Miss. If it’s not in the store, you’ll have to wait until they restock it themselves.”

“You misunderstand, I’m not here to buy anything unless you have a bullhead or airship in there, I’m looking for passage to Mistral.”

“Unfortunately Miss, we only get one airship supply drop a season out here. You already missed this season’s a few weeks ago. Most of our shipping is done by trucks. A caravan is scheduled to arrive in a few days, depending on how smooth their ride has been. You may be able to land a place with them. We don’t have much to ship back to the kingdom, so you could probably even go as a passenger.”

Raven was a bit irritated at the infrequency of air travel. Still, since Mistral didn’t care about the outlying villages, it made sense, “I am perfectly capable of carrying my own weight. The caravan trip about how long does it take?”

“No more than two weeks, but that’s only if they encounter bandits. In general, it takes about a week and a half.” The old man replied

As Raven turned to leave, she asked, “And I can meet the caravan here?”

“Yes, they will offload here.”

If Raven was honest with herself, she hoped the tribe would attack the caravan, it would make everything so much easier.

Raven checked the port every day following the man’s suggestion; however, the day the caravan was supposed to arrive came and went. When two more days had passed, and the caravan still had not arrived, the freight master began to get worried, “If it takes much longer we’ll have to call our suppliers in Mistral to tell them that the caravan’s gone and we’ll have to eat more of what we catch to survive until the next caravan arrives.”

However, early the next morning, a series of damaged trucks lumbered into the village. The last vehicle was being towed by the one in front of it. Raven only made it to the docks in time to catch the end of the story of what had befallen the travelers.

“... and so Marigold here braced herself against the fridge truck and let loose on the bastards.” 

The girl, the leader, indicated waved around what looked to be a cross between a mace and an anti-tank gun. “I got one guy in the face broke his aura in one shot at that point he and his buddies realized they weren’t gonna get these trucks from us and so they all retreated. The weirdest thing, though, was that they had a flag some kid in the back had a pole with some sort of winged emblem, like a dragon or something, and they all grouped around this kid before they ran off. I tried to shoot out the flag just to spite them, but something with that many holes in it already is hard to hit.”

Raven chose this moment to break into the conversation, “Are you sure it was a dragon, not some kind of bird?” Under her father, the tribe used to present a standard with a blackbird with dripping wings before attacks. It gave the weak a chance to surrender instead of being slaughtered.

The man who was speaking first turned to her, “What’s got, you all antsy young lady?”

Raven needed to think fast a cover for how she knew about the tribe’s habits. Putting on what she hoped was a meek face, she pulled a story together, “It’s just when I was younger, my family lived in a small community outside of Mistral. Several years back, we were forced out by a large bandit tribe before they attacked the displayed a banner with a dripping bird on it and told us everyone who ran wouldn’t be killed. I was wondering if this could be the same group?”

“Makes sense not many would forget a run-in with the Branwen Tribe at its height, but there is no need to worry. About a year back, a group of close to twenty huntsmen was contracted to take care of them. The disguised a bunch of armored cars as SDC transports and drove straight through Branwen territory. The bastards couldn’t resist such a lucrative prize and attacked it. The huntsmen cut them down, including their leader. The huntsmen took the banner as a trophy. It’s hanging up in Haven Academy now. While I suppose it’s possible some of them escaped and maybe even scrounged up a replacement banner, the tribe may as well no longer exist, nothing to be worried about.”

It took all of Raven’s willpower not to let her rage show on her face. She needed to keep up the lie, “I guess I just wish I could have gotten a piece of them.” Raven hated the way those words sounded, but she supposed she could direct them in her head to the huntsmen instead. She had assumed that the tribe would be down on its luck, but to find out it had been nearly wiped out while it meant more work to put it back together, the huntsmen had likely done her work to secure the top spot much easier assuming most of the veterans were dead. “Anyway, I was hoping to get a place with you when you head back to Mistral. I don’t have a huntsmen card though, my family ran out of money before I could finish school.”

“Legally, I can’t sign you on as protection then,” the bigger man responded, “However if you have some money, we can take you on as a passenger. If you don’t, I might be able to find you a place as an alternate driver if you at least have a driver’s license, but the pay would be little to nothing.”

The only license Raven had was her huntsman one as it was a sort of all-purpose permit that could be loaded with whatever qualifications she had. “How much would you charge for a single passenger?” Raven only had the one choice her previous lies had made it impossible to show the caravan any official documents lest they see her real name.

“I think a hundred lien should suffice.”

“I can only pay seventy-five,” Raven retorted.

“Ninety.”

“Eighty.”

“Eighty five, final offer.”

“I’ll take it, but I’ll only pay forty now the rest when we get to Mistral.”

“That’s fair.” The man stepped up to her and offered his hand, Raven shook it.

“I have one more question,” Raven said as she let go, “When can I expect you to leave?”

The leader looked over to the woman, Marigold, “Well, insurance will cover the busted truck, and we still got its cargo here, so if we just write it off, we could leave in two days the repairs to the rest of the fleet won’t take long.”

“Sounds good,” the leader turned to the freight master, “Where can we leave the truck for you to break it up?”

The old man indicated a spot on the side of the warehouse, “If you just leave it around there, I’ll deal with it.”

Raven spoke up again, “So should I pay you now or when we leave?”

“Pay us when you join up at the gate, and we’ll get you squared away then. By the way, I don’t think I caught your name.”

“You never introduced yourself, either.” Raven shot back.

“Fair, my name’s Rowan Steele, my partner here is Marigold Heartwood.” He looked back at Raven expectantly.

“I’m Raven,” she paused for half a second to judge their response and see if they would expect the last name, they continued to stare, “Branch.” That would do for now. The duo seemed to accept it anyway.

—

The truck Raven had been residing in lurched to a halt they were about halfway to Mistral there was shouting outside, and a few weighty shots rang out. Raven assumed it was bandits but was more curious about who it was that was attacking them. It took her a second to find her sword before she jumped out of the truck and then vaulting on top of it to get a better view, surveying the tree line she spotted a tattered red banner the middle was mostly burned out. Still, enough of one wing was visible that Raven recognized it as her father’s banner. She hadn’t dared hope it would be this easy that they would attack the same caravan they had already hit on its way out.

Regardless she drew her blade selecting a red cartridge the blade extended to its full length, which she swiftly drove through the roof of the cab, impaling the driver before he had a chance to notice something was wrong. Raven jumped to the next truck. Rowan and Merigold were busy attempting to drive off the bandits with gunfire into the forest their backs to the caravan.

Raven examined the two huntsmen Merigold’s heavy rifle while individually more damaging Rowan’s combat rifle’s sustained fire would be more dangerous to have at her back.

Waiting until Merigold to begin reloading her massive rifle Raven dove off the truck at Rowan while his aura stopped her from killing him outright it knocked him over and sent his weapon flying into the bushes. She had landed on his back with her blade pressed to his spine the constant pressure quickly wore through his remaining aura, and the crimson blade sunk down into his neck.

Merigold had reacted fast enough to the new threat Raven had heard the click as the other woman reflexively tried to fire the empty weapon at her but then stood there seemingly stunned as Raven finished her partner and turned to her.

“But, what… How could you?” Merigold was sputtering.

“I’m not the one who accepted a strange woman into their midst with no knowledge about her.”

A flicker of rage sparkled in Merigold’s eyes she abandoned the shell she had been attempting to load and charged Raven with a broken scream the rifle shifted to the form of a large mace Raven evaded the wild attack quickly landing a cut across the other woman’s side as she moved past. Merigold rounded on Raven again, charging at her. Raven dashed to the party, but this time, Merigold had managed a feint, and Raven ran square into the mace’s head, tossing her back into one of the trucks.

Raven’s aura held, and she recovered quickly, ducking under a follow-up swipe at her head. The wide swing left Merigold’s right side open, and Raven darted for it slamming the point of her blade into the other woman’s abdomen she was rebuffed by aura again.

Raven pivoted back to Merigold, “You certainly put up a better fight than your partner. I was worried about you after he went down so easily.” She smiled as she opened some distance on her opponent, “You are clearly strong. I’d offer you to join me, but unfortunately, you seem rather attached to your friend.”

“Join you, and what the two of us become outlaws holding up caravans for the rest of our lives?” Merigold’s laughter “Yeah right, how about I kill you now and keep my job.”

Merigold charged Raven again, aiming a strike at her stomach, “Your loss. By the way, I can’t remember, did I mention on the trip I’m pregnant?” 

Raven smirked as she watched a look of panic cross the other woman’s face as she tried to both decide whether Raven was lying and redirect her attack just in case she wasn’t. The clumsiness left Raven exactly the opening she was looking for as the heavy mace dropped to swipe her legs. Raven dashed at Merigold, slashing the blade across the huntress’s throat. She was rewarded with orange light crackling across her opponent’s body.

Raven advanced on Merigold, who attempted to make a last-ditch effort to keep her at bay, though without her aura behind it, the strike was slow and clumsy. Raven jumped to the side and cut upwards, removing the other woman’s hands, leaving the mace to crash down somewhere behind her as it followed her backswing. “Before I kill you, I suppose I should tell you who you really let into the little group.” Raven kicked Merigold in the chest, forcing her to crash backward with nothing but stumps to catch her. “My name is Raven Branwen,” Raven chuckled as Merigold’s eyes widened even as they dimmed from blood loss, “Yes, exactly like the bandits, you really should not have trusted me oh well your loss.” With that, Raven plunged her blade into Merigold’s throat, the remaining light faded from the woman’s eyes.

* * *

A Note on Raven:  
If you are curious yes Raven is pregnant with Yang however since I don't think Raven would name her daughter after Taiyang, given how and why she left, her daughter will be called Oriole Branwen when she appears in the main story. Don't worry Yang is the only character name I will change. I initially planned to write up to her birth but I decided that it would be both boring to read and tedious to write so I'm moving on from Raven/Yang next chapter.


	3. Launch Day

Noir was carefully watching the entrance to the amphitheater. Blanche hadn't shown up yet, and now she was pushing being late.

A wave of relief washed over her when she saw the familiar white hair and short stature of her sister Noir stood on the bench and waved an arm over her head and called out to her sister, "Blanche over here I saved you a seat."

At her shout, Noir saw her sister scan the crowd and lock onto her waving arm. After disengaging from the boy, she was walking with her sister ran over to her.

"So, sis, how's your first day going?"

"Well, after I ditched you, I almost got run over by this girl pushing a cart of weapon-grade steel. That wasn't the worst part of it, though, she then tried to blame me. She said I didn't belong at Beacon if I couldn't notice her cart."

"There you are!" A tall red-haired girl appeared behind Blanche.

Blanche turned to face the girl, "Not you again. You almost killed me."

"But, your aura…"

"That is so not the point, you then had the audacity to blame me, when _you_ were the one rushing the death cart through the crowd."

Blanche began to ramble at this point about safety and regulations and the like. Noir placed a hand on her sister's shoulder to bring her back to reality. "Hey sis, instead of going off on her, maybe you should ask why she came to find you after you clearly got off on the wrong foot." Noir shot an apologetic look over her sister's head at the other girl.

Blanche's attempt to look aloof by crossing her arms and turning her chin up only succeeded in making her look like a petulant child, but at least she stopped talking. Regardless, Noir took the lead, " So, umm, didn't catch your name."

"Corundum," the other girl clipped the end of her name, seemingly about to explode as Blanche had done.

"Right, so, Corundum, why did you seek out my sister then?"

"Well, I was going to apologize, but clearly, she's completely incapable of being mature."

Blanche bristled and locked her eyes on Corundum before starting a new tirade, "If you were going to apologize, why didn't you start with that."

"You didn't give me a chance, as soon as you turned around you started into me."

As the argument began to escalate again, Noir let her head fall into her hand. She shook her head to prepare herself and stepped between the girls. "Both of you stop it." She looked at her sister, "Instead of continuing to fight, why don't you start over."

That phrase almost always worked on her sister. She had a bit of a one-track mind that she sometimes needed to be reminded to start over and collect her thoughts. Her strategy worked, and Blanche let out a long breath and then looked back to Corundum with her usual cheerful smile. "Hi, my name's Blanche Neige. What's yours? Let's be friends." Blanche offered her hand to Corundum.

"Yeah, we'll paint our nails, try on clothes and talk about cute boys like blonde and scraggly over there." Corundum gestured at the boy Blanche had walked in with. The boy looked up with interest at being mentioned.

"So we're friends now?"

"No." Corundum glared then turned on her heel to walk away.

Before she could storm off, though, professor Ozpin took the stage Corundum instantly turned to face the stage. The headmaster gave a very dull speech about the academy and its history. Noir zoned out. She came back as Blanche poked her side.

"Sis, come on, Professor Goodwitch said to go to the ballroom to set out our sleeping stuff."

"Wait, Goodwitch, wasn't Ozpin on the stage?"

Blanche rolled her eyes at her sister. "I'll never understand how you can just completely disengage from the world sometimes." Blanche grabbed her sister by the hem of her flannel and dragged her into the crowd, surging toward the ballroom.

As the two sisters departed, Noir caught a glance of the boy Blanche had arrived with attempting to catch Corrundum's attention.

—

Noir lay on her stomach, her dark hair freed from its tight braid spread across her back. She had her scroll in her hands but was only half paying attention to the fighting game she was playing content just to let her mind wander. Eventually, her sister returned from the shower, flopping down on her sleeping bag next to her and rolling over to stare up at the ceiling.

Noir closed the game on her scroll. "That bad, huh?"

"Yeah, it's weird not knowing anyone here. I mean, it's not like I'm not happy that I got into Beacon, but other than you, I don't know anyone. All my friends either didn't bother applying, or they didn't make the cut. I'm only here because Signal had such a small class, they couldn't fill their reserved slots, so Siren got one of their available spots, and I was the next one down on the waiting list." Blanche placed an elbow over her eyes and sighed.

Noir tried to lighten the mood. "You're not completely friendless what about that boy you walked in with."

"Who Jaune," Blanche peaked out from under her arm, "I guess he's nice…"

"There you go plus one friend." Noir poked her sister's side.

"Hey!" Blanche swatted at her sister's hand. "Anyway, if you'd have let me finish, I was going to say there was something strange about him. He didn't recognize dust manipulation, and when I mentioned my semblance, he seemed equally confused but didn't say anything. Besides, I'm fairly sure Corundum counts as a negative friend, so, back to zero."

"So you met your nemesis. That doesn't mean she counts as a negative friend." It was always up to Noir to put people problems in perspective for her sister. She was a genius with glyph formulas, but people routinely stumped her. "I'm sure there is a perfectly reasonable answer for Jaune's behavior too. Maybe he was privately tutored, and his teacher only focused on stuff related to his fighting style."

Noir only got a non-committal answer from her sister. Looking over, Noir saw Blanche had flipped back on to her stomach and was surveying the ballroom, "This is kind of like a big slumber party isn't it. Though, I'm not sure Mom would approve of all the boys."

Noir could tell when Blanche was trying to change the topic, so she decided to play along. "You're probably right, should we call her and ask her to complain?"

Blanche looked at her with a mock horrified look spread across her face, "I didn't say _I_ minded the boys."

Noir lay on her side and watched her sister scan the crowd for a while until she stopped in the middle of one of her sweeps of the room. Following her sister's gaze, she appeared to have locked onto a blonde girl with a thick ponytail leaning against one of the far walls. She was setting up an electric lantern on a tripod and retrieving a book from her bag.

"So, do you know her, Blanche."

"Know who."

"The blonde across the hall, you were just staring at her sis."

"Uhh, yes, sort of, she kinda chased of Corundum off when we first met earlier, but she left before I could thank her."

"You want to go talk to her?"

"She looks busy, maybe later."

Noir, however, had already made up her mind and grabbed Blanche by the wrist and began dragging her across the ballroom, shouting, "Nonsense, no time like the present."

Once she had pulled her captive to her target, Noir shoved her sister in front of her and shouted a greeting. "Hello! My sister here says you've met?"

"The girl that got run over, right?" the blonde shoved a plastic bookmark into her novel and set it aside.

"Yeah, that's one way to put it," Blanche's voice sounded slightly strained at the reminder, "My name's Blanche Neige, you can just call me Blanche."

"Well, my name is Taiyo Chisanaryu. You gonna introduce your sister?"

"Errr, right, Taiyo, this is my sister Noir, Noir, Taiyo."

"Well, it was nice meeting you, but I'd really like to get back to my book. It's getting to a great part I can tell. One of my favorite characters is on his way to his uncle's wedding at a bridge."

Blanche and Noir involuntarily winced, and Blanche began to create an exit, "Well good night then, err I hope it all goes well for him in the book." Blanche then pulled her sister back to their little spot of floor.

"I kind of feel bad for her," Noir whispered, "She's gonna be really disappointed tomorrow."

Several long minutes later, as the sisters were quietly conversing, they heard their new acquaintance cry out in anguish, followed by the sound of a book being slammed shut. A chorus of shushes echoed around the room.

* * *

Corundum had gotten up early as she usually did and was sitting at a table in the Beacon cafeteria with a bowl of cereal and a plate of bacon. As she ate, she browsed the news on her scroll. She saw nothing special, just some tabloids about Weiss Schnee accepting a position at Atlas Academy and her and the Invincible Girl choosing to train at Beacon.

Corra was startled out of her mindless scrolling as the voice of Professor Goodwitch came across the school intercom, saying the first-year students only had two hours before they had to be at the initiation. Wolfing down the rest of her cereal, she grabbed the remaining bacon in a napkin and headed for her locker to grab a towel and get to the showers before her peers.

After she had showered, she pulled on her long combat gown. The skirt was split into four panels for ease of movement, and the waist was cinched with a belt, the tail of which hung down to her mid-thigh. A bandolier connected to the belt, the leather strap across her torso, also held the magnetic plate for her weapon on her back. After her dress and fastenings, she fixed a black pauldron to the bandolier crossing her left shoulder and pulled on her fingerless gloves and attached her gauntlets to them, and tightened the straps to her arms. All of her armor had magenta scrolling along the borders, the geared rose of her family's emblem was emblazoned, also in magenta, on her right gauntlet. Next, she pulled on her heavy combat boots over her black tights. Finally, she took a magenta circlet a few shades darker than the detailing on her armor, and embossed with a design of thorny black vines and placed it under her arm as she walked to the bathroom to fix her hair. When finished, her hair was brushed down her back, stopping at her shoulder blades and held back out of her face with the circlet minus the few strands left free to frame her face.

Finished dressing Corra pulled her weapon, Thorn, from the locker, currently, in its primary form, it resembled a massive greatsword, as Corra checked it over she shifted it through its other forms. First, the edges pulled together as the spine of the blade shifted out, changing into a diamond cross-section that flared out towards the handle, so it resembled a lance. At the guard, Corra pressed another toggle, and the tip of the lance split apart slid back, clearing the muzzle of a rifle buried inside. Finally, Corra twisted the handle of her weapon and pulled the whole rifle mechanism from inside the lance/blade. Shouldering the gun, she checked the sights were in order and loaded the magazine before clicking the rifle back into place and returning the weapon to its base blade form. She then activated the magnetic plate on her bandolier and attached Thorn to it, so the handle peaked over her right shoulder.

When she chose her locker Corra had made her choice based on who had already claimed the surrounding lockers. As she had finished her preparations, Corra's first choice for a partner made her way to the adjacent cabinet to begin checking her own weapons. Corra decided that this would be the perfect opportunity to start scouting her for partnership.

"So Pyrrha, what are your thoughts on partners? I'm sure everyone is desperate to pair with someone as accomplished as you."

Pyrrha turned to look at her, "Hmm... I'm not quite sure. I was planning on letting the chips fall where they may."

"Well, what about me. I mean, I think we would make great partners. We are the two strongest students in the school by my estimates, so if we team up, no one would be able to beat us."

"That sounds grand." Pyrrha turned back to continue checking her weapon.

"So you're interested this is going to be great. Look at us," Corra had stepped close to Pyrrha, "We could be sisters or cousins or something. We should come up with a duo name, something to do with crimson, I think, or is there another shade you prefer?"

Corra was suddenly broken from her tangent when a blonde head entered her field of view.

"You know what else is great? Me, Jaune Arc. Nice to meet you."

Corra immediately went on the defensive, "What do you want now. I was under the impression I made my feelings towards you perfectly clear yesterday when you made a pass at me then."

Pyrrha pushed her way between the two to greet the newcomer, "Nice to meet you, Jaune."

"Yeah, yeah," Jaune pushed Pyrrha behind him to continue his quest to impress Corra, "So Corundum, I couldn't help but overhear your fondness for me the other day."

"Come on, is that what this is about. That was a joke if another guy had been standing where you were, I would have talked about him."

"Don't worry! No need to be embarrassed! So, been hearing rumors about teams! I was thinking you and me would make a good one! What do you say?"

Corra was about to go off again when Pyrrha once again intervened, "Actually, I think the teams are comprised of four students each, so-"

"You don't say," Jaune, rounded on Pyrrha before she could finish, "Well, hot stuff, play your cards right, and maybe you could join up with the winning team."

Corra now butted back in, "That's enough playboy. Don't you know who you're talking to?"

Jaune looked back at her, "Not in the slightest, rose maiden."

"This is Pyrrha, top graduate of Sanctum and four-year winner of the Mistral Region Tournament. It's a new record."

"Hello again!"

Jaune seemed confused, "Should I know what those are?"

Corra was sure this guy had been living under a rock, but there was one more place the idiot might understand, "Maybe you'll know this one. She's on every box of Pumpkin Pete's cereal box."

Jaune let out a comical gasp, "That's you?! But they only do that for star athletes and cartoon characters!"

Corra had a bit of a sneer on her face, "So now that you understand who she is, do you think you measure up to her standards?"

Jaune hung his head, "I guess not," he mumbled.

Corra was about to turn away satisfied she had effectively cowed the interloper when Pyrrha spoke up with, "I think you'd make a great leader Jaune."

Jaune was blushing and opening his mouth to say something when Corra whirled around, "Why on Remnant are you encouraging him, Pyrrha! This has gone on long enough; come on Pyrrha, let's go."

As Corra reached out to grab Pyrrha, Jaune blocked her as he got in close to Corra, "Sounds like Pyrrha's onboard for Team Jaune. Spots are filling up quick! Now, I'm not supposed to do this, but maybe I could pull some strings, find a place for you. What do you say?"

As he spoke, Jaune pressed his face closer to her own, "That is enough you are too close." Corra followed her exclamation up by shoving Jaune with both hands, knocking Jaune back several feet where he tripped over the bench in the middle of the room and fell back against another locker seemingly dazed. Corra then turned on her heel and walked out to the cliffs; Pyrrha followed hesitantly behind. As the two girls left, Pyrrha checked over her shoulder to see if Jaune was alright, followed by a timid wave of apology.

By the time that Corra made it to the cliffs, she was much calmer. That calmness didn't last long as Professor Ozpin explained how teams would be formed. It seemed ridiculous whoever they laid eyes on first what kind of metric was that there would be no guarantee of compatibility. Her mind was wandering so far she almost missed her launch, luckily the whoop of the person to her left broke her train of thought just enough to give her time to brace before she was catapulted over the Emerald Forest.

* * *

10 Years Earlier

* * *

Violet Ceder was a reasonably new officer in Vale's police department, but she had been on the force long enough to have been assigned a fair number of truancy calls. However, this one was a bit odd. Usually, the student was of late middle school age at the youngest, but this call was for a five-year-old girl. Another oddity was the fact that her father was a teacher. Surely he understood that his daughter should be in school? Maybe the girl was sick, and in dealing with it, he had forgotten to inform the school?

Violet expected to find a neighbor at home with a sick little girl and that she could call the station and tell them all was fine and then get on with her day.

Things immediately started to go wrong when she knocked on the door, and a little girl's voice answered, "Who's it?"

Well, little kids are durable, Violet thought. Maybe she's just too sick to go to school but not to play around the house. She must have just got to the door before whoever is watching her.

"My name is Violet, and I'm a police officer. Is there an adult there with you I can speak to?"

"Nope. Just me!" the kid replied, popping the P.

Violet's heart sank, "Well then is your name, Ruby? Ruby Xiao Long?"

"Yep, that's me."

"Well, Ruby, may I come in?"

"No! Mommy says that I can't let strangers in the house."

"It's okay, Ruby, I'm not a stranger. I'm a police officer, remember."

Violet could almost hear the little girl thinking before she heard Ruby say, "I guess that's okay then."

After a few seconds of locks being turned, the door opened to reveal a little girl with black hair and a red hooded vest. Violet stepped inside and turned to the child, "So Ruby, why are you home alone?"

"Daddy's been acting funny he said that Mommy isn't coming home, but that's silly 'cause Mommy always comes home she's just late. After Daddy told me that he went to sleep and now he sort of forgets about me, he goes to work super early, and I don't know the way to school 'cause Daddy always drives me, so I just stay home."

Violet's heart broke at Ruby's rambling story, but she realized she needed to get in contact with the precinct to move forward with this case now. First, she needed to take care of Ruby, "I'm sorry about that Ruby, now why don't you show me your favorite toys and then I'll go make some calls to see if I can help you. Okay?"

Ruby then dragged Violet to the main room and showed the officer a variety of grimm toys and one white-cloaked action figure. Ruby proceeded to explain that the white figure was her mother and that she defended the world from the grimm.

Once Ruby was happily playing, Violet stepped to the room's threshold and took out her scroll to put a call to her boss.

"What's up Violet, you done with that truancy call yet?"

"That's the problem, Seargent I found the girl home alone, according to her, the mother was a huntress. Apparently, she recently died on a mission. She also told me that her father has been ignoring her since her mother was declared dead. I think we need to get child protective services involved, but I've never done this before, so I wasn't sure how to get the ball rolling."

"Are you alone in the house with the girl?" the sergeant responded.

"Yes, sir."

"Alright, here's what we're going to do. You need to stay put, I'll send a pair of officers to you then you can ride back with one of them and the girl CPS will meet you here. Then if they deem it necessary, we will send a few people to pick up the father and go from there."

"I could just bring her…"

The sergeant cut Violet off, "We are already breaking procedure for you to be there alone with her, so I need to send a second car to ride with you and the girl."

"I'll wait, sir."

"Good. Keep an eye on her. It will take a while to get a car to Patch."

"I will, sir. I know, sir."

"Goodby, Officer Cedar." the sergeant hung up.

Violet spent the next hour watching Ruby smash action figures together on the floor. Sometimes Ruby would call her over and ask Violet to hold several grimm while her "Mommy" figure beat them down.

Eventually, Violet heard a car pull up out front, and two sets of boots walk up the front steps. The two new female officers introduced themselves as Cerulean Waters and Aurum Kurtz when Violet met them at the door.

"So which of you am I riding back with?" Violet asked.

The smaller officer who identified herself as Cerulean answered, I figured I'd come with, Aurum here can be a little... intense." Cerulean gestured to the larger muscly woman she arrived with.

Violet nodded in agreement, "Okay, so now we just have to convince the kid to get in the car. Oh, and another thing, did the sergeant say anything to you guys about CPS?"

Aurum spoke up this time, "Yeah, they wanted to talk to the father, so some of our guys are headed to Signal to get him."

"But no info on him yet? Nothing we can tell his kid?" Violet responded.

Aurum shook her head.

"Anyway," Violet continued, "I think we should introduce her to as few of us as possible, so Aurum, you should go back out to the car. Cerulean, follow me."

Violet lead the Cerulean back into the other room where Ruby was still smashing action figures together on the floor.

"Cute kid," Cerulean remarked.

"The white figure she plays with is supposed to be her mother," Violet said.

"The dead one?"

"Yeah, but she doesn't really understand that yet. Poor girl thinks she's just late coming back from a mission."

"Who's that?" Ruby was looking up at them from the floor.

Violet led Cerulean closer and got down on a knee to talk to Ruby, "Ruby, this is my friend Cerulean she came here to help me take care of you."

"Oh, but I don't need someone to take care of me. I have Mommy and Daddy; they will come home soon."

Cerulean bent down, too, "That's just it sweetheart mommies and daddies aren't supposed to leave their little girls home alone so until we figure out where they are you need to come with us."

Violet picked up where Cerulean was going and continued, "It will be fun come on; you will get to ride in a police car."

Ruby's response was not what they expected; she started tearing up, "I'm sorry I didn't mean to. I'm sorry."

Violet put her arm around the sobbing girl, "What's wrong dear, it's just a car ride."

"Only bad people ride in police cars. They go to jail. I don't want to go to jail." Ruby blubbered into Violet's side.

Taking Ruby's chin, Violet looked directly into Ruby's eyes, "That's true, but do you know who else rides in police cars?" Ruby shook her head, "Police officers also ride in police cars does that make us bad people?" Ruby shook her head again, "So are you okay with taking a ride with us." Ruby nodded.

Cerulean and Violet each took one of Ruby's arms and led her out to Violet's cruiser, where they buckled her into the back seat. Ruby fell asleep somewhere on the ferry to Vale.

* * *

A Note on Ruby's Last Name:

I have always favored an AU/headcanon idea I read somewhere over a year ago that Tai gifted Ruby the last name Rose when she was a bit older to have something else to connect to her. As this past section takes place just weeks or months after Summer's death, this can't have happened yet. I had planned on the Ruby section to be longer, but the chapter was already over 4k words, and the scene break seemed like such a natural end I decided just to leave it. Hopefully, it comes across as complete.

Another thing, I should be approaching the end of the stuff that is taken almost directly from the episodes. I have been trying to switch around and change up the lines allocated initially to the RWBY girls to illustrate that my girls are not reskins of individual girls of Team RWBY, but instead, genuinely separate characters forced by some cosmic cast director to attempt to fill the roles left by Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and Yang. I hope this has come across and not felt like a painful retread of the canon.

The biggest problem I have with the Beacon arc is that the original main cast is mostly reactionary, which means until I conclude it, I'm stuck on a fairly linear path with only minor ways to alter it. If I had my way, I'd jump into the story at the end of V3 with my girls fully realized and then continue from there, but I know I would hate reading a story that did that, so here I am wading through the Beacon arc. All this is really just a super long way to say don't be surprised when V1 gets trimmed way down because I find it super unengaging.

Yes, Taiyo is supposed to be reading a Remnant equivalent of A Storm of Swords in case you were curious.


	4. Through the Woods

Blanche, whooped with joy as she careened through the sky. As she reached the peak of her arc and began to fall, Blanche began to make black glyphs made of orbiting circles. As she smashed through each one, Blanche slowed until she made it to the ground, kicking up a little dust as she impacted.

As she checked her surroundings, she pulled Moule from her belt, forming a long spear nearly a foot longer than she was tall. Blanche looked around the clearing she had landed in, attempting to gauge which direction she needed to go.

Eventually, Blanche just picked a direction to go in. As she ran, she called out, "Noir, Noir, where are you."

Ahead Blanche saw movement, so she poured on more speed, enhancing it slightly with another glyph Blanche rocketed into the clearing and barrelling into someone knocking them over. As she looked down to see who she ran over, she immediately regretted it, because looking up at her was a pair of deep magenta eyes framed by wine-red hair.

Blanche immediately jumped up angrily, shouting, "No, No, No, Why'd it have to be you. I wanted to find Noir, heck I would have taken Jaune, but no, it just had to be you."

Corundum stood and looked down at Blanche, "Look, I did not want to see you here either, but it looks like we are stuck together. I am certain that the Headmaster and Professor Goodwitch have ways of monitoring the forest; otherwise, how could they possibly enforce such a ridiculous rule. So, we may as well try to work together."

Blanche screwed up her face, took a deep breath, and then opened her eyes and held out her hand, "Fine. Truce?"

"Truce." Corundum shook Blanche's hand. "If we are going to be partners, please call me Corra. I have always thought my full name sounded a bit rough."

Blanche smiled, "Okay, Corra. Sooo, which way's the temple?"

"Well," Corra began gesturing vaguely out of the clearing, "I was heading this…"

The snap of a twig to their left cut Corra off as both girls turned to the noise. Blanche edged toward where her weapon fell when she ran into Corra. The series of growls that surrounded them in the next second made Blanche forget her attempt to be silent and rush to pull the spear from the ground. She was not a second too slow. A beowolf came charging at her from the edge of the clearing. Blanche had just enough time to take a knee and flip up the spear and ground the shaft before the monster was on top of her, literally. In the beast's haste, it had impaled itself on the tip of her spear. Unfortunately, this had not even come close to killing the grimm. Blanche attempted to wench the spear free but found it stuck, focusing she reshaped the point removing the barbed points and yanked the now javelin shaped rod from the monster's chest. With quick check behind her and Blanche used a glyph to open the distance between her and the beast. While airborne, she returned the tip of her spear to a barbed point. When she landed, she turned to see Corra dodging and weaving between four other beowolves. However, she had her enemy to face as her beast snarled at her, scratching at the wound in its side.

"Come on, you," Blanche shouted. She choked up on the spear and planted the base in the ground.

However, the beast did not charge her; instead, it continued to glare at her. Cautiously, Blanche reached down and flipped open the red vial on her waist and dipped her finger inside. As she withdrew it, a thin stream of red dust floated out, following her finger. When Blanche touched the shaft of her weapon, the dust adhered to the weapon. She quickly recapped the vial and then concentrated. The dust began to flow down her weapon and form a bright orange-red glyph around her. She then thrust forward with her spear, and six jets of fire exited the points of the glyph and streaked towards the beowolf. Four managed to impact, and the monster howled. Enraged, it charged her again. Concentrating on the residual dust on her spear Blanche caused to flow to the tip as she braced herself again for the beast's charge.

Stepping into the charge, Blanche let a cone of flame blast out the tip of the spear just before the spear bit deep into the grimm. The gout of flame then burst out of the monster's back. However, before it died, the beowolf managed to get in a single strike. The grimm's right claw raked across her back, making Blanche cry out as her aura flickered. Thankfully the monster began to dissipate into black smoke shortly after. Blanche sagged and looked towards Corra, sighing in relief that she was in the process of beheading her last two beowolves with one swipe of her massive sword. She hadn't noticed her aura go down.

Blanche strolled towards her new partner, "So, that way?" She pointed toward where Corra had indicated earlier.

"Right, or at least that was the direction I was headed in when you ran me over." She paused for a second, "Hey, I guess that makes us even. I hit you; now you hit me." Corra smiled down at Blanche.

Blanche just rolled her eyes, "I suppose it does. Should we go?"

Corra nodded and returned her blade to the magnetic plate on her back before beginning to walk off. Blanche followed behind, waiting for Corra to be looking away to return her weapon to its standard bar shape, just in case her semblance taxed her still recovering aura too far. Thankfully, it didn't, but there was no harm in being too careful.

"So four beowolves at the same time," Blanche began hoping to strike up a conversation, "That's pretty impressive."

"I mean, I've been training for as long as I can remember. My mom was a huntress before she and my dad got married, and when I showed interest in following after her, she was only too happy to work with me." Corra turned to Blanche and smiled, "Between you and me, though, I think she was just happy to have an excuse to take her weapons out of storage. There are not many opportunities for combat in Atleasian high-society."

"My mom was going to be a huntress too, but she got pregnant with me pretty soon after she finished at Beacon. My father left when she told him about me, so she had to do security work in the city to be able to raise me. Then she met my dad, and they had my little sister, which was great, but then he went out on a hunt and never came back. Mom had been so excited Noir was just getting old enough that she was thinking she'd be able to start being a huntress able to trade on and off jobs with my dad. Then she was back to being a single mom and now had to support two young kids, but she got through it. And since my baby sister made it into Beacon two years, early, Mom can go and be a huntress now without having to worry about us. It's like everything is finally paying off." The smaller girl had a brilliant smile across her face as she giggled a bit.

Corra smiled too then asked, "Your sister was the girl you were with at initiation, right? The one that tried to force us to make up?"

"Yep," Blanche responded, "I'm super proud of her for making it into Beacon now. You know she was personally invited by the Headmaster? I was kind of hoping I'd get to be her partner. Oop!" Blanche clamped both hands over her mouth, suddenly remembering to whom she was talking. "Sorry, not that I don't like you. It's just… ummmm…Sorry."

Corra looked down at Blanche, her face somewhere between offended and laughing. "It's fine the teachers' rules mean I doubt everyone got who they wanted as a partner."

They continued in awkward silence for about another minute before Blanche got tired of the quite and kept talking, "Anyway, so, Noir and I learned to fight together since we compliment each other so well. Noir has a ton of aura, and her semblance allows her to project her aura into walls wherever she wants, so she has defense covered. That meant I could focus on offense, which suits me fine. My semblance, allows me to reshape any metal infused with dust, and since it is dust based so I can also do dust casting. Dust fascinated me, but Siren only had classes in basic dust casting, so I had to rent books from the library to learn more advanced techniques like glyphs. However, since I'm self-taught, I can only do the baseline stuff. I can throw around the basic elements and slow down or speed things up, but not much more."

"Most huntsmen use dust strengthened metal in their weapons," Corra turned to Blanche with a smirk, "You ever use your semblance to ruin someone's weapon?"

"No, that would be rude, especially during training," Blanche replied, "Just because I can replace my weapon with any bar of metal doesn't mean everyone else can. For most huntsmen, their weapon is their whole world. If I went about breaking all of my classmates' weapons, I'd have fewer friends than I already have." Blanche's voice then got small, "There's also my other problem."

"What was that?" Corra leaned down toward Blanche.

"Just that I try not to use my semblance to break other people's weapons." Blanche tried to look innocent.

"I heard that part." Corra squinted at Blanche, "What was the last bit the part you whispered. It sounded like you had a problem."

Blanche tried not to respond, but the more she looked at her partner, the more her will caved, "Fine, but it's only because you're my partner, and you should probably know this. I don't have a lot of aura. I can only stand a few hits before it goes down. I can't use my semblance on my enemies' weapons because if I got that close and something went wrong, I'd still get taken out. As long as I have friends to run interference, I can still be strong, you'll see." Blanche beamed up at her partner. Her expression then shifted to one of mischief, "So since I just bared all my secrets to you, what do you have to give me?"

"Well, I have a fairly large aura reserve, so my style is designed to take advantage of that, my height, and my semblance. You can't tell anyone else this except our team. I like to keep it a secret, but my semblance allows me to slow things or people down. I use it to extend my window to dodge imperceptibly, and then get inside the opponent's guard and then give them a proper beating with Thorn here," her hand trailed back to the grip of her sword. Corra looked down at Blanche's waist, "Is your weapon really just a big stick?"

Blanche smiled, "Yep, my semblance basically let me skip the forging class. Though, you will hear no complaints from me, white clothes," Blanche gestured down to her combat skirt and white bomber jacket lined with violet wool, "and forges don't mix I was perfectly happy to keep clean." That elicited a giggle from both girls who then proceeded on in companionable silence.

A few minutes later, the two girls made it into a much larger clearing with a ruined semicircle of a temple on several pedestals rested chess pieces Blanche bounced up to survey the pieces. "Corra, I'm picking the golden queen, is that okay?"

"That's fine, Blanche. Hey, you want to wait here to see who else shows up."

"Yeah, let's wait. I want to see if Noir will show up. I hope she's alright."

As the words left Blanche's mouth, a rustling at the edge of the clearing drew both girls' attention. A branch moved aside, and two figures stepped out, one dressed in black the other in gold.

Blanche immediately recognized the black-clad figure as her sister. Dipping into her violet container, Blanche dropped into position for a runner's start and made a black glyph appear underneath her. As she twisted her hand on the ground, the glyph turned purple and launched her toward the figures as she shouted, "Nooooooirrrrrrrr!"

Blanche's progress was halted just feet from her target by a blueish-grey barrier causing her to slump to the ground.

"Owww! That wasn't very nice. Anyway, so you found, Taiyo, was it?"

Taiyo smiled and nodded, "You remembered." Taiyo then looked past Blanche, "I assume that the heiress is your partner then?"

"Yeah, that's right. Come on, let's go, you guys need to pick a relic." Blanche reached out and grabbed her sister by the wrist; she then reached out for Taiyo's. Blanche then thought better of it and pulled back, dragging only her sister toward the temple, "Corra and I already grabbed the gold queen you guys should take the black one then we'll have the full set."

As Taiyo caught up with the sisters, Noir looked back toward her partner, a slight smile playing across her face, "Shall we indulge my sister?"

Taiyo rolled her eyes, "If it will make the little girl happy, why not?"

Blanche bristled, "I am _not_ a little girl! If anyone should be treated like a child, it's Noir. After all, she's the wone that's fifteen." Blanche then turned to her sister, "Noir, your partner's being mean. Make her stop."

"You know, I don't think I will. If Taiyo is going to be my partner, she gets the same rights to tease you that I do."

Blanche just stuck her tongue out at her sister and rounded on Taiyo, "Fine then. Taiyo as an honorary sister, I challenge you to a duel. If I win, you can't call me a little girl." Unfortunately, Blanche could not maintain the stern look on her face and quickly dissolved into giggles.

"How about we get out of the monster forest before we start fighting each other." Corra's voice carried from where she had been waiting on the other side of the temple.

However, before Blanche could voice her agreement, a shriek pierced the forest. Turning in the direction of the sound Blanche worriedly said, "That sounded like a girl, should we, ya-know do something?"

"Corra shrugs reaching for her weapon, "That would seem like the appropriate response, they may be in over their head."

Before they could begin to head out a screaming, something, arced over the clearing smashing into a tree on the other side. Looking at the crash site Noir turned to Blanche, "Isn't that your friend from the other day. What was his name, Jim?"

"It was Jaune, and yes, it appears it is," Blanche replied.

However, before they could contemplate the situation any further, a roar pierced the clearing, and the four girls now turned towards it. Entering the clearing was a large ursa. Before any of the girls could finish drawing their weapons, a pink-tinged explosion went off behind the grimm.

"YEEE-HAAAAW!" An orange-haired girl rolled off the back of the grimm and poked a few times at its face, before declaring dejectedly that it was broken.

Another figure emerged from behind the dissipating grimm and admonishing his assumed partner. He quickly noticed that she had run off towards the temple and was singing about the golden rook she was balancing on her head. She stopped when the boy called out what was presumably her name, shouting, "Nora!"

Nora responded in kind, "Coming Ren!"

This time it was Taiyo's turn to be confused, "Did those two just ride in on an ursa?"

Nobody got the chance to respond, as the clearing was again disturbed as first Pyrrha made an entrance, and then a deathstalker smashed its way through the trees on her tail.

Pyrrha looked to the tree on the other side of the clearing and shouted at Jaune still stuck there.

Jaune responded with her name and tried to get out of the tree. All he managed to do was fall on his face. As he staggered towards the small group at the temple, Pyrrha landed at their feet.

Noir looked around at the edges of the clearing, "Hey, is that everyone?" When nothing else happened except the deathstalker bearing down on them, further Noir concluded, "Everyone is here, good. Now we can all die together."

It would be Taiyo who spoke up next as she drew her thin curved blade from her sash, "Well, we may as well go down fighting. Who knows, we may even take it with us."

The rest of the group shrugged as they grabbed their weapons and got into their fighting stances.

* * *

7 Years Earlier

* * *

Ruby had been at the orphanage for three years. It had been three years since she was told her daddy was sick and that she would have to live with the other kids that did not have parents. Three years since she had been told that her Uncle Qrow could not take care of her because he was not really her uncle, and it did not matter because he drank too much anyway. It had been three years since she had met Neo.

The only nice thing about this place had been Neo. She had been her roommate ever since she was taken to the orphanage by the police officers. When Ruby had moved in, the smaller girl had been reading a picture book on her bed. Ruby had wanted to see it and had asked the girl, but instead of sharing as her mother had always said little girls should do, the girl instead curled up in the corner of her bed and hid the book behind her long brown hair. When Ruby had tried to get her to share, the girl pushed her, and Ruby started crying. However, nobody came to help her, so she asked the girl again, and again, and again. Eventually, Ruby got board and pulled one of her books from the small bag she was allowed to bring from home and curled up on her bed to read.

A little while later, Neo came up and tore Ruby's book from her hands and went back to her bed. Ruby started to cry again, and again nobody came to help her. Looking across the room, Ruby saw that Neo had left the book she was reading when Ruby came in at her feet. So Ruby raced across the room and snatched Neo's book and darted back to her bed. Immediately Neo jumped off her bed, an angry look on her face; she then held out her hand to Ruby making a beckoning motion. Ruby shook her head and clutched Neo's book to her chest. At that, Neo pounced on Ruby, hitting and scratching at her, but Ruby refused to give up the book. At some point, Ruby kicked out with both feet and sent Neo sprawling to the foot of her bed. Ruby sat up and arranged to trade the two books she gave Neo hers, and Ruby received her own. That would be the first time Ruby stole something, and the first time she got in a fight.

After that interaction, Neo had mostly left Ruby alone, but this didn't sit well with Ruby. As the months went by, Ruby noticed that Neo never talked, so Ruby made that her avenue of attack. For months Ruby pestered her roommate constantly. One night Ruby decided to wake Neo in the middle of the night to see if she could get her to say something. Once she was sure Neo was asleep, Ruby tiptoed to the foot of her bed and then jumped up and pounced on her roommate. The smaller girl awoke with a start and belted Ruby across the face. Ruby, though, didn't mind because as she was waking, Neo had spoken.

As she was waking, Neo had, not shouted as Ruby had expected, but in a half-whisper had said, "What!"

So as her roommate pummeled, her Ruby dissolved into a fit of giggles, saying she had, "Done it." Eventually, Ruby calmed enough to block Neo's punches and pinned Neo to the bed. Looking down at her victim, Ruby said, "I heard you," Neo's face went white, and she squirmed under Ruby, "I knew you could," Ruby continued. Neo squirmed more, but Ruby was heavier wouldn't budge. "I'm not moving until you ask me to get off. I know you can."

In the dark, Neo glared at Ruby, and Ruby just smiled back. After several minutes, Neo's lips moved.

"I can't hear you," Ruby singsonged.

Neo's lips moved again this time Ruby head a light whisper.

"Still can't hear you," Ruby sang.

"Get. Off. Me." This time though, it was still faint Ruby heard Neo. However, She decided to continue to play with Neo.

A mischievous smile played across Ruby's face, "You didn't ask nicely, you have to say, 'Please.'"

"Get off me. _Please_." This time was even louder than last time Ruby didn't have to struggle to hear, and so with one last smile, Ruby rolled off Neo and began to walk back to her bed.

Before she left, Ruby got one last idea, "Goodnight Neo."

The other girl did not respond, so Ruby poked her. It only took a few dozen pokes for Ruby to get a quiet begrudging, "Goodnight Poopy." Even if Neo was being mean, Ruby still knew she had won.

That was the first time Ruby would use extortion to get what she wanted.

Following that incident, Ruby got Neo to talk to her more and more. Neo would never speak outside of their room, but that only made it more special, she was the only one who got to hear Neo speak. After some time, the two girls became inseparable. If one of them was caught doing something wrong, the other was immediately implicated. They also made huge fusses anytime someone came to look at them for adoption if they wouldn't look at the other, or more accurately, Ruby would throw a tantrum, and Neo would be her usual non-verbal self, which it seemed people were not willing to put up with.

—

And that leads back to the present. The two girls were in the yard of the orphanage, attempting to steal a new book from a new arrival to the orphanage. Neo walked up behind the girl who was sitting on a bench and clasped her hands over her eyes while Ruby snatched the book from the girl's hands and raced away. Neo then dragged back on the girl's head, pulling her off the bench into the mud behind it, leaving her to cry as Neo ran away back to their shared room.

Ruby felt Neo flop down next to her on her bed. The two girls were shoulder to shoulder as they read through their new prize. Even though they had been doing this sort of thing for a while, they only had their stuff in their room. Ruby insisted that they return the items they stole to their owners after they were done with them. And so it was that late that night Ruby snuck into the new girl's room and left the book on her side of the bedside table and then crept back out without waking anyone.

* * *

Ah hahahaha! I'm evil aren't I. To be honest I hate hurting Ruby as much as you probably hate reading it but it must be done to serve the plot I must break her down and rebuild her. I tried to show that while Neo has been a bad influence on Ruby, Ruby has managed to be a somewhat positive influence on Neo. They participate in aggressive borrowing and not theft...

Yet.


	5. Getting to Know You

Blanche took a few steps back behind the line everyone else had created and formed Moule into her staff, holding it in her left hand. Her right hung ready at her belt to open whatever dust capsule she needed.

Suddenly Taiyo disappeared from next to them and appeared on the grimm's back a few seconds later. She was trying to find purchase with her sword, except she continuously seemed to be failing. She eventually lost her balance and fell between the creature's legs. A gout of flame splashed from the tip of her sword, which caused the grimm to move sideways, which kept it from stepping on her.

Spurred on by their peer's attack, Corra, Pyrrha, and Nora rushed forward to assault their foe. Jaune and Ren trailed behind. Meanwhile, Noir and Blanche edged closer at a slower rate giving cover to their allies. When claws legs or tail got to close to someone's blindside, a blue-grey shield would intercept it. Blanche would let loose fireballs and spears of ice whenever someone knocked the monster off balance and created an opening.

Eventually, Corra jumped back out of the fray and shouted, "This isn't working. Nothing we have can get through that armor. We need a new strategy."

Jaune was the only one to respond, "What if we just, you know, left? Like, run for it?"

"We all have relics. Right?" Corra asked. Hearing a few scattered affirmatives, she continued, "Okay, everyone, fall back to the cliffs."

As the group ran, it slowly dawned on them that maybe this had not been the best idea because as they ran smaller, grimm began to trickle out of the woods and make passes at them. Blanche had returned Moule to her side and had resorted to her more straightforward dust casting. She had not quite gotten the hang of using her offensive glyphs on the run yet. Her fingers flew to her belt, dipping into various vials, and flinging small elemental bursts at any grimm that came to close. Everyone else, except Jaune, had their weapons in ranged mode to do the same.

Looking up, Blanche could just make out the top of the cliff through the trees, and her heart soared they were almost there. Her hope was quickly dashed as the trees opened up not onto the open ground at the cliff's foot she expected but an enormous gorge that held another old temple connected to the forest by a narrow bridge.

"Now what," Blanche exclaimed, looking to Corra, "We've run out of road."

In response, Corra looked to Pyrrha, Ren, Nora, and Jaune, "If you four can keep the deathstalker busy, we'll keep the rest off you. What do you say?"

Pyrrha looked to Jaune, who spluttered, "You want me to decide?" When he looked back at Corra, he suddenly seemed to straighten, "Not that I can't or anything. We've got this."

Corra looked to the other three girls, "Alright, you three are with me. We have to give the others space to work. Blanche, you and I will take the left Noir and Taiyo the right. Okay, go."

Blanche wanted to speak up and say she should go with Noir, but before she could, Noir had run off with her partner. Blanche sighed and shaped her weapon into a spear again.

Corra looked over her shoulder at her and called back, "You can use that form if it makes you more comfortable, but I'd like to see what you can do on support. I'll try to keep the worst of it off you."

"Got it," Blanche yelled back.

She did not switch her weapon back to a staff, but she did change her posture to stand straight up and reach into the red vial again, pulling dust out and adhering it to the spear. Concentrating a much larger red glyph appeared on the ground around her and began to spin slowly, gaining speed. Once the spear stopped glowing, and the glyph was spinning so fast it only seemed to be blurred circles, Blanche picked up the spear and swung it from left to right in a half arc. As she traced out the shape, a massive wall of flame sprung up from the ground at the edge of the forest, engulfing the nearest grimm and forcing the rest back. Once the treeline was burning, Blanche released her hold, and the flames died down a bit, but the burning trees still blocked the most of the grimm. With reinforcements cut off, it was a relatively simple task for Corra, Noir, and Taiyo to clear up the grimm remaining inside the circle. Blanche took shots where she could, but her glyph had taken a good chunk out of her aura, and she needed to recover. Eventually, Jaune's group defeated the deathstalker by jamming its stinger into its head, and the group of eight was able to find a way up the cliff to the teachers.

* * *

Corra looked up from the crowd as teams CRDL and JNPR were formed eventually, Professor Ozpin called, "Blanche Neige. Noir Nightshade. Corundum Hesperrhodos. Taiyo Chisanaryu. The four of you retrieved the two queen pieces. From this day forward, you will work together as Team CBNT (cabernet). Led by Corundum Hesperrhodos."

Corra was happy with her appointment. Sure it was what she had expected, but that didn't make her feel any less proud. She really couldn't ask for a better team except maybe to swap someone for Nikos, probably the Taiyo girl. She seemed to be the least versatile. Even Blanche, whom she had initially lamented running into, had proved to be a powerhouse in her own right. Her partner's sister, too, was very capable even given her age; she was good. Even if she was a defensive specialist like Blanche said, Noir's style would help control the field of battle. That would let her take the most advantage of her style and confront her enemies one by one.

As Corra walked off the stage, she smiled. She was going to have a great time at Beacon.

—

That night the girls of the new Team CBNT were settling down for the night in their new dorm. Taiyo was the last one in the shower while the rest of the girls lounged around the room. Corra sat at her desk by the door, writing an email home while Blanche and Noir lay on their beds, playing some game with each other on their scrolls.

Eventually, the shower shut off, and a few minutes later, Taiyo came out of the bathroom as she did Corra heard Blanche gasp. Thinking it was something in her partner's game, Corra ignored it until Blanche spoke.

"You, umm, you have scales." Blanche sounded confused.

Corra turned around and gaped Taiyo was standing in the bathroom's doorway with a towel over one arm and her usual robe-like garments over the other. She was wearing a pair of long baggy athletic shorts and a crop-top pajama shirt. In the gap between the top of her shorts and the bottom of her top where Corra would have expected to see skin, sure enough Taiyo had scales.

Her belly was covered in wide white scales, which got smaller and faded into an olive green towards her sides. Her sides and back were olive green spotted with patterns of gold and black. If she had the time to think about it, she would have said it was quite beautiful. However, she was not thinking about looks just what it meant.

"You're a faunus." It wasn't a question Corra was making a statement.

Taiyo looked at Corra coolly, "Very good observation Heiress. Will this be a problem?"

Corra sputtered, her right hand went to her back and in the absence of a weapon began to rub the back of her neck, "Why are you here, or better question, Why were you hiding this fact?"

"I'm here for the same reason you are Heiress, to learn," Taiyo kept her eyes on Corra's, "as for your second question, it makes me more comfortable…"

"I'm sure it does, you get to pretend to be one of us that you are human." Corra was almost snarling.

Taiyo continued locking her eyes with Corra's, "You did not let me finish. I wear the close I wear because that is how I like to dress. I am not ashamed of my heritage, just because I am a faunus does not mean that I should be forced to dress a certain way to show off my trait. I prefer a bit more modesty in my day to day life than would be required to show off my scales. However, they do get itchy you see scales were not designed to work with sweat so I prefer to let them breathe at night."

Corra was still not satisfied, "So you expect me to believe that you are not actually some secret faunus, even though you have been hiding what you are for the past two days."

Taiyo glared, "Yes, I do. What else would you think I am."

Corra looked away at the rest of the room and saw the way her other teammates were staring at her and realized she must look like the bad guy. She looked back to Taiyo, and her emotions flared again, and then she realized why she was reacting like this. She wasn't angry she was afraid. That realization caused her to break, and she said what she had been thinking the whole time, "You could be a White Fang assassin sent for me. I know the Schnees are their main focus but I know my family is not well-liked either."

Taiyo actually laughed, and that almost set Corra off again. Still, before she could say anything, Taiyo responded, "I'd be a pretty terrible assassin then, after all, I've just given up my element of surprise. If I were still a member of the White Fang and were sent here to kill you, I'd have kept my gi on stabbed you once you were asleep and fled. No, you don't have to worry about me I'm just another student."

That made sense to Corra, but then her brain caught something that put her back on edge, "Wait, what did you mean still a member of the White Fang."

Taiyo didn't look phased, "You need to understand something about Vale, Heiress. Before about eighteen months ago, basically, every faunus in Vale was a member of the White Fang. Vale has never been quite as bad as Atlas or Mystral in its treatment of faunus. I mean, it's no Vacuo or Menagerie, but still, it's not awful, so while the White Fang had a presence, it was more involved in the community. They ran a few faunus community centers where we could gather to hang out. They even had stuff like exercise equipment and training weapons for those who wanted to be huntsmen. I'd go after school to see my friends and work out with them and just chat. It was great, but as is the way of the world, things change."

"What happened," Corra asked tentatively.

"Well like I said it started about eighteen months ago, the High-Leader apparently got fed up with the way the Vale branch was operating so she replaced the old leader with her little protege to give them a taste of leadership in a quieter area. The girl is our age, but she's brutal as they come. At first, people were annoyed that a sixteen-year-old was put in charge, but from what I've heard, she dealt with dissenters quite harshly. Eventually, she had control of the branch and began to change things.

It started small instead of just free weights at the centers. There were now trainers. If you were working out, it was expected that you were learning to fight. Then there were the masks before she came. They were optional if you wanted one you could have one, but most people didn't wear them. About a year ago, she made them required to enter the centers. It was around this time I quit, so the rest that I know is from the few times I got bored and snuck into rallies or is second hand from my friends. Anyway, a few months later, she closed the centers and made the rallies the only way for members to meet. Now in the last three or four months, she's been basically forcing recruitment. Everyone that goes to a rally is forced to join. All this time, she's also been ramping up the violence attacking transports taking hostages and the like. It's caused Vale a lot of trouble because the police force wasn't equipped to deal with this, so tensions have been high lately.

So, Heiress is that enough of my life story to convince you I'm not going to stab you in your sleep."

Corra nodded, "There is one thing though, do you know who it is that is in charge of the Vale White Fang."

Taiyo smiled, "I do, the Belladonna's girl is running the show. That make you feel better?"

Corra shuddered, "Not really if anyone would be gunning for important targets from Atlas it would be her. No matter how hard Atlas pushed the truth, it never seemed to get through to those idiots."

Taiyo laughed, "I agree."

Corra cocked her head to the side, "You what? But you said you were part of them."

"I did say that," Taiyo replied, "However I am also my own person. What did Atlas stand to gain from it? Nothing. If anything they lost they created two martyrs and then had to deal with riots instead of mostly peaceful protests. The only people who stood to gain from the deaths of the elder Belladonnas was the new High-Leader. She got the power and could run the group however she wanted. It's obvious to me that Siena Kahn ordered their deaths."

Corra looked at the other girl in a new light, "What about the 'retaliation,' where do you stand on that?"

"You mean the Schnee girl?"

Corra nodded.

"To be honest I'm not sure," Taiyo shifted her weight and looked up to the ceiling, "It is definitely something the High-Leader would be capable of, especially if there were people who were suspicious of her involvement in the Belladonnas' deaths. However, it was never conclusively proven she ordered it. I'd say fifty-fifty odds she had it done."

At this point, pillows were thrown at both Taiyo and Corra. Both turned to the beds and saw their respective partners glaring at them. "Guys while all of that is _very_ interesting," Noir had a bit of an edge to her voice, "It is super late and we want some sleep _before_ classes tomorrow. So if you wouldn't mind, either leave and talk elsewhere or. Go. To. Bed."

Taiyo walked up to Corra and extended her hand, "So Heiress are we good?"

Corra took the offered hand and nodded, "Let's go to bed Lizard Girl."

Corra then reached for the light switch and turned out the lights.

"Good night, Heiress."

"Good night, Lizard Girl."

"If you have to give me a nickname Heiress," Taiyo said with a bit of humor in her voice, "At least call me something related to dragons. That is what I am after all."

"Okay then. Good night Dragon Girl." Corra smiled and then rolled over and fell asleep.

* * *

6 Years Earlier

* * *

Weiss had not been trying to eavesdrop on her parents. She had been walking back to her room from the library and passed her mother's terrace when she heard the shouting. She knew she would be in trouble if caught but was too curious about what was being said.

It sounded like her father was in the middle of one of his ranting lectures, "And all you do day in and day out is sit up here like a useless lump while I work to keep this company running."

Her mother didn't answer ], Weiss could imagine her staring off the balcony with her glass to her lips.

Wiess heard her father continue, "Fine, then ignore me. I'm only your husband. It is a damn good thing I didn't marry you for your personality. The only useful thing you've ever done for me is giving me your name."

Weiss heard a glass shatter.

Weiss then heard her mother speak in a tone she had never heard before, "My name is that all I am to you, Jacques?"

Weiss felt a chill in the air all of a sudden. "When we started, Jacques did, you know I thought I loved you. You were handsome, and you were willing to take on so much that I couldn't. My father knew I could not run the company, but he trusted you, and so did I."

Weiss saw snowflakes drift under the door. "However, you revealed your true colors to me. It was slow at first, but ever since my father died, you have gotten worse and worse. Now you have pushed me too far. I was willing to be the perfect society wife for you. I was willing to bear our children, but I refuse to take your abuse any longer."

"Our eldest child is dead, Jacques, dead Winter has not even been gone six months, and you are here berating me for grieving. She was my child my first; I know she was too headstrong for you, but I loved her. Now you come and tell me I am nothing but a name to you. Well, I have had it."

Weiss's hands were getting cold, and she looked down solid ice was now flowing from beneath the door and was creeping around her hands. Weiss quickly picked up her hands and stood her ear still pressed to the door listening as her mother continued. "If I am just a name to you then, We. Are. Done. I know I can't take your position away Father's will was very clear about that, but the company is still mine Jacques so I'd step carefully if I were you. I might not be able to force you out because of this, but I can make the board watch you very closely. As for our personal affairs, I want you out. This house is still mine, and I want you out."

Weiss heard hurried steps towards the door, and she quickly sprang back and down the hall, where she hid behind a suit of armor. After some struggling, she watched the door fly open, accompanied by the sound of ice shattering. Her father ran out of the room, looking over his shoulder a few times as he retreated down the hall away from her. Weiss was about to leave when she saw her mother step out of the room, standing taller than she had ever seen before. A cheese knife clutched in her left hand, while a thin sparkling layer of frost clung to her clothes. Weiss watcher her mother look down the hall at her father's retreating back before she sank to her knees. The knife fell from her hand and clattered across the ice on the floor.

As her mother sat there, Weiss contemplated going over to her, and when she saw her mother let her face fall into her hands, and silent sobs wrack her body, she made up her mind. Slowly Weiss stood and walked over to her mother and knelt next to her. Carefully Weiss put a hand on her mother's shoulder.

Willow looked up a startled look in her eyes. When they met Weiss's, they softened, and Willow put an arm around Weiss. "You heard mommy and daddy's fight, didn't you, Weiss."

Weiss nodded hesitantly, "Is father really leaving?"

Willow sagged a bit lower, pulling Weiss with her. Weiss noticed a flicker of what she could only identify as sadness cross her mother's face, "It's for the best Weiss."

A part of Weiss was hoping her mother would elaborate, but she never did. They sat there Weiss with her head in her mother's lap while her mother stroked her hair. Eventually, they were found by Klein, who was worried about the way Jacques was acting. When everything was explained, he took Weiss and her mother to their rooms to prepare for dinner.

* * *

A Note on the Weiss Blake Turning Point:

Yes, Winter is dead, and since I likely won't show her death in the main story I guess I will explain it here. She was killed in an attack by a supposedly rouge White Fang cell. Her limo was bombed on the way back from her first semester from Atlas. The bomb did not kill Winter but it did break her aura and disorient her. The group of terrorists then grabbed her from the wreck and beheaded her filming the whole thing on a scroll.

I know Willow's confronting of Jacques may seem out of character. However, she is at this point a woman pushed beyond the brink. Winter's death pushed her to the point that the emotional collapse of her marriage did in the show, so when that additional emotional bombshell was dropped on her by Jacques it pushed her past her breaking point and she snapped at Jacques. The ice was her slightly losing control of her semblance and using the ice dust that was being used to cool her wine.

Anyway, the attack was apparently in retaliation for the death of Ghira and Kali Belladonna which according to the White Fang's narrative was ordered by either the Schnees themselves or at least Atlas's upper class. The couple was killed during the breakdown of a protest in Mantle. The autopsies done by Atlas showed they were killed at short-range by a small-caliber pistol and it was ruled that they were killed by someone in their group.

Obviously, Siena denies this narrative and pushes her conspiracy theory. However, as Taiyo said most non-White Fang members actually believe the official story from Atlas.

The death of Blake's parents is the single point that sets both Blake and Weiss on new paths, just as Raven's decision to keep Yang is the flashpoint for Yang and Ruby.

Sorry for the long Note, catch you next time.

**Author's Note:**

> I have decided to put this story up on this site as well as FFN it is under the same name there as well.


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